Current multimedia programming such as video programming generally requires users to manually select content of interest. For example, a number of sites exist on the World Wide Web for providing video clips and the like. However, these sites generally require users to select videos for playback one by one. Thus, a user must manually locate a video of interest, select the video for playback, play it, and then repeat the process to play other videos. Accordingly, present mechanisms for presenting aggregated multimedia content such as video content generally do not present the aggregated content in a continuous stream. Further, users are generally limited to accessing such multimedia content via traditional computing devices (e.g., personal computers) connected to the Internet, and cannot access the multimedia content via television sets or the like.
In addition to video or multimedia aggregation websites, numerous sources presently exist for multimedia content such as video content. For example, video is presently broadcast into many homes on tens if not hundreds of channels. Generally not all of the content even on a single channel is of interest to a user, and certainly not all of the channels available are likely to be of interest to the user. Video on demand (VOD) is available to some subscribers to video services, but present VOD services generally allow users to select and view items of multimedia content, e.g., a movie, sporting event, etc, one at a time. Such items are generally at least thirty minutes long. Further, other than using a program guide such as an interactive program guide, a printed program guide, etc., users presently have no way of locating and viewing video content of interest other than by performing a manual search. Moreover, present program guides generally are generic and display a predetermined set of broadcast or video-on-demand programming available to a user, where users have a limited ability, if any, to customize the program guide.
In short, present mechanisms for presenting aggregated multimedia content such as video content do not filter or arrange multimedia content so as to present particular multimedia content of interest to the user upon the user's demand. Further, present mechanisms for presenting aggregated multimedia content do not allow a user to make a single request that returns a plurality of multimedia items without forcing the user to select the multimedia items one by one for viewing or listening.